Plain view doctrine

Limitations

For a law-enforcement officer to legally seize an item, the officer must have probable cause to believe that the item is evidence of a crime or is contraband. The police may not move objects in order to obtain a better view, and the officer may not be in a location unlawfully. These limitations were detailed in the case of Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321 (1987).

The plain view doctrine only eliminates the warrant requirement, not the probable cause requirement. Investigators must normally obtain a court-issued warrant before seizing property, by presenting enough evidence to a magistrate judge to meet the probable cause requirement. When using the plain view doctrine, investigators must possess the evidence needed to meet the probable cause requirement, as they are only exempt from the step of obtaining a warrant from a judge.

The doctrine only authorizes the seizure of contraband or evidence; it does not authorize a further search or additional investigation. Therefore, if investigators do not have enough evidence to meet the probable cause requirement, they may not even conduct a relatively nonintrusive search to establish probable cause. The requirement is that the incriminating character of the object must be immediately apparent. In Arizona v. Hicks, police officers were in an apartment investigating a shooting and suspected that a record player in the apartment was stolen. The officers could not see the serial number, which was on the bottom of the record player, so they lifted the player and confirmed that its serial number matched that of one that had been reported stolen. However, the Supreme Court ruled that lifting the record player constituted an additional search (although a relatively nonintrusive one) because the serial number was not in plain view. This meant that the plain view doctrine did not apply, and the officers needed a warrant. The evidence of the stolen record player could not be used against the defendant because of the exclusionary rule, which is the remedy available when evidence is obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

The officer must be lawfully present where he or she sees the item. For example, an officer may not enter a suspect's home without a warrant and rely on the plain view doctrine. However, if an officer is inside a suspect's home under an unrelated warrant, he or she may rely on the plain view doctrine, subject to the doctrine's other requirements. In Arizona v. Hicks, the police officers were in the apartment under another exception to the warrant requirement, exigent circumstances. This qualified as a lawful entry, and the plain view doctrine applied to items that the officers could see in the apartment and readily identify as contraband or evidence without further search.

Subdoctrines

The plain view doctrine has also been expanded to include the subdoctrines of plain feel, plain smell and plain hearing. These doctrines are also limited to seizing an item when its nature as contraband or evidence of a crime is "immediately apparent." In Minnesota v. Dickerson, a police officer felt a lump in a suspect's pocket during a lawful frisk search. He did not immediately have probable cause to believe that it was contraband, but he proceeded to inspect it further by squeezing it, and then had probable cause to believe that it was a piece of crack cocaine. The Supreme Court held that this additional inspection was not covered by the plain view doctrine, and as such, the contraband could not be used against the defendant. However, the court's reasoning extended the plain view doctrine to other senses, such as the sense of touch.

Application to technology

In the case of United States v. Wong, police were searching the defendant's computer for evidence related to a murder when they discovered images of child pornography on the computer. Although the warrant was specific to evidence of the murder, the Ninth Circuit held that the plain view exception allowed them to seize the child pornography, as searching graphics files was valid under the warrant and the files were immediately identifiable as contraband.

However, as with the application of this doctrine elsewhere, the plain view doctrine only justifies a seizure of evidence or contraband that is in plain view, and it does not justify a further search. In United States v. Carey, a detective was searching a computer for evidence of drug trafficking. When he opened an image file that depicted child pornography, he proceeded to search for more images and found a total of 244 images of child pornography on the computer. The Tenth Circuit held that only the first image was covered by the plain view doctrine, and the rest of the images could not be used against the defendant in court.